A Cup of Kindness Yet
by Astralis
Summary: It's New Year's Eve and there's a party in the break room, but Sara doesn't feel like going. NS.


**DISCLAIMER:** I don't own them, and the title comes from "Auld Lang Syne".

* * *

Sara was beginning to forget what life felt like. She'd been staring at a computer for three hours, watching, waiting, as thousands of fingerprints flashed before her eyes. At first, she'd wondered idly about the people the fingerprints belonged to - who they were, what they'd done - but now she was just in a half-asleep daze, trying to stay awake and focused long enough to get this done.

"Hey, stranger."

Sara jumped as Nick's voice broke through the fog in her head. "Hey," she said, ignoring his amused laugh.

"How's it going?"

Sara rubbed her forehead. "It's not. What's up?"

"Take a break."

"What are you, my supervisor? I've got dozens of prints to eliminate from a crime scene at the Tangiers."

Nick, who had been standing behind her, came and sat on the edge of the computer desk, partly blocking her view of the screen. "Party in the break room," he said, in a tone that clearly suggested this was something to get excited about.

"A party."

"Yup."

"_Why?_" The programme beeped and stopped running. No matches. Sara gave it another print.

Nick frowned. "Sara, just as, you know, a little survey. Or, whatever. What day is it?"

"Does it matter?"

"Bear with me."

Sara considered smacking him to wipe the smug smile off his face, but didn't. "Thursday?" she guessed, half-heartedly.

"It's _Friday_, Sara. And what _time_ is it?"

The clock in the corner of the computer screen informed her that it was 11:45 p.m. She passed this information onto Nick without particular enthusiasm.

"And what's special about today?"

Sara sighed. "A woman was raped at the Tangiers in the early hours of the morning?"

It was Nick's turn to sigh. He regarded Sara for a few seconds, and said, "Something good, something people _celebrate?_"

Sara closed her eyes for a second and thought. The answer popped, with a sudden crystal clarity, into her head. "New Year's Eve," she said triumphantly.

"Bingo. We're counting down in the break room."

Sara tried to look tempted for a second, and failed. She wasn't a New Year's Eve person: she preferred to let one year fade into the other without a fuss. Parties weren't her scene. "No thanks." She was aware of Nick's eyes on her: he was studying her like she was evidence. Embarrassed and annoyed, she dropped her gaze to the floor.

Nick slid off the desk. "You sure?"

She nodded. "Yeah."

"Okay."

As Nick turned and made his way out the door, something made Sara spin in her chair and say "Nick - thanks."

He flashed her a smile. "No problem."

Sara returned to her work, to the endless display of fingerprints racing before her eyes. It was the sort of thing that could drive someone nuts after a while, but she'd had plenty of practice. She was almost asleep anyway: she'd been called out to work the rape scene at the Tangiers just before she went off duty, and had been so wrapped up in the case she'd forgotten to go home to sleep.

She didn't envy the others their party in the break room. It was tradition that everyone who worked New Year's Eve gathered there to count the New Year in and celebrate it with junk food. Five New Year's Eves she'd worked at Las Vegas, and five New Year's Eves parties she'd missed. Celebrating the New Year with a computer and fingerprints was fine by her.

It was harder, this time, to space out again, back into that zone where it was just her and the prints and a nagging tiredness behind her eyes. Unconsciously, her eyes kept dropping to the time on the computer screen.

11:49 p.m.

11:52 p.m.

Just after the clock had flicked over to 11:53 p.m., Sara heard footsteps behind her. She turned to see Nick, cautiously holding two cans of Coke, a small bowl of potato chips, and a plate with two pieces of chocolate cake on it. "Nick..."

"It's New Year's Eve, Sara." He carefully deposited his cargo on the desk. "You can't spend it alone."

"Nick - " she protested, flattered despite herself. "There's a party."

"So I heard." He grinned. "It's no great loss. Everyone's standing around drinking Coke and eating. They're all stone-cold sober. It's boring."

Sara couldn't help grinning. "Where'd the cake come from?"

"Greg."

Sara looked at the cake with sudden suspicion, and Nick laughed. "He didn't make it. He bought it. I don't think Greg knows how to bake."

Sara caught Nick's laughter. "Oh well," she said, "neither do I."

Nick stopped laughing and gave her a sincere smile. "I've missed you, Sara. Missed _working_ with you," he added, maybe a little hastily.

Sara nodded. "Since the shift change. Yeah. Me too. Enjoying swing shift?"

He shrugged. "It's different. Less variety, just me and Catherine and Warrick."

"I know what you mean."

Nick cast a glance at the no-food-or-drink-near-the-computers-sign. "Your case going to go to hell if you go over the other side of the room for a few minutes?"

Unexpectedly relieved at the chance of a break Nick was offering her, she shook her head. "Probably not."

"Good." Nick took a seat on the other chair, loaded himself up with the food and Cokes, and propelled himself across the room, well away from the computers. "Wouldn't want to break departmental regulations or anything."

"No," said Sara, following him over in the same way. "Being trusted employees and all."

"Yeah." Nick opened a can of Coke, passed it to her, and checked his watch. "Two minutes to go. Food?" He brandished the bowl of potato chips.

"Thanks," Sara said gratefully, taking a few.

"When did you last eat? Sleep?"

"I don't know, and I don't want to think about it." Sara took a few more.

"Should look after yourself better, Sara." Nick's voice was serious. Concerned.

Sara looked over at the computer as if to reassure herself that nothing exciting had happened. Nothing had. "I'm fine."

"Yeah. Sure." Nick's voice had just the tiniest edge of disbelief in it.

"Don't," she said quietly. "Not tonight."

Nick smiled a tiny smile. "Tomorrow night, then."

"Huh."

"I'm serious, Sara. You've gotta eat and sleep. Helps, you know?"

"You been taking lessons from Grissom? I'm fine, Nick, this is just how I operate." Sara was beginning to be a bit annoyed. Half the crime lab seemed to think it was their duty to tell her to eat and sleep more. After her failed attempt, years ago, to explain the problem to Grissom, she wasn't likely to tell anyone else why she wasn't enthusiastic about sleeping. And the eating - that just tended to fall by the wayside. She hadn't starved yet, and that was always a good sign.

Apparently Nick had decided to change the subject. "How was your year, then?"

Sara ran her mind over countless hangovers, dozens of empty alcohol bottles, and the absence of any particularly cheerful feelings. "I've had better. How was yours?"

"Same old."

A distant cheer and shouts came from the break room. Nick checked his watch. "Happy New Year, Sara."

"You too."

Nick seemed to be thinking about something. "So, here's to this year being better. For both of us." He raised his Coke can. Sara followed suit, and they touched their cans together with a dull metallic clink and drank.

Nick handed her a piece of the chocolate cake. She pretended not to notice as she maybe overreached a tiny bit in taking it from him, brushing her hand against his. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she justified it as a long-suppressed need for human touch. Sara was a little embarrassed about how fast she devoured the chocolate cake, which wasn't even proper food, and knew Nick was noticing.

As she finished the cake the computer beeped. No matches. Sara sighed, but didn't move to input another fingerprint. After all, it was New Year's Eve, and she was long overdue for a break. She didn't ask if Nick had work he was supposed to be doing, and he didn't comment on the progress of her fingerprint search. They just sat there in silence, finishing off the bowl of potato chips and their cans of Coke.

It was a little weird, this. Half of Sara was perfectly content, for reasons she didn't understand, just to sit here with Nick and do nothing. The other half was urging her to go back over to the computer and her fingerprint search, before her emotions did something she was likely to regret later. It was _Nick_. Why should anything happen? She'd sworn off men after Hank Peddigrew - well, she'd sworn off men-except-for-Grissom, and that hadn't gotten her anything but pain. She was allergic to men and Nick was a perfect gentleman and nothing was going to happen, even if he _was_ watching her with those _eyes_.

Sara looked down and tightened her hands around her can of Coke.

"I guess..." Nick said, faltered, and stopped.

"What?"

"I was going to say I should go back to work, but..."

"Yeah." Sara felt the can denting under the pressure of her fingers.

"Yeah." Nick stood up. Sara, automatically, stood too.

Neither of them moved.

"Well," said Nick, eventually, looking down and then back up at her. "I really should go. And you've - you've got your fingerprints to run."

"Yeah. That's right," Sara replied, trying to ignore the part of her that was going to be really lonely when Nick left. In fact, she was actively trying to silence it. The last thing she needed was to fall for another co-worker, after the grief the last one had caused her.

"Yeah," Nick said, nodding. Suddenly their eyes met and they both laughed. Sara didn't know who laughed first, but it was something they both needed. She wasn't entirely sure what was funny - aside from their both standing here like a pair of idiots - and she doubted Nick did either... but it was nice.

Nick stopped first. Before she knew what he was doing, he'd raised a hand and brushed her hair back behind her ear, leaving a burning stripe across her cheek where he'd touched.

Sara caught her breath, and didn't move.

"Sorry," Nick exclaimed quickly, dropping his hand. Maybe he felt the burning, too. And was it just her, or did his voice sound weird - sound lower?

"No, it's okay," she said, hating the unwanted, slightly breathless tone in her voice.

"Okay," Nick echoed. "I - uh -"

Sara swallowed.

"Happy New Year, Sara," he whispered, and kissed her on the cheek.

Sara was beginning to believe that either she'd forgotten how to breathe, or she'd fallen asleep at the computer and this crazy thing was all a dream. Or both. She was, after all, standing very very close to _Nick Stokes_, of all people, and he had such very brown eyes, and she'd lost all ability to think straight and that happened in dreams, she was sure.

But then she didn't often have dreams of this variety.

As if to find out whether this was real, she put a hand on Nick's arm. He felt real enough - warm, and solid, and something else, something she couldn't quite define.

Sara found her breath again, and decided that it should be illegal for men to have eyes like Nick's. She really ought to go back to work, because fingerprints were safe, fingerprints didn't stare at you with big brown eyes making it impossible for you to look away or to move at all.

Nick's other hand was touching her face, just one finger running down to her jawbone and along to her chin. Afterwards she always told herself that it was then that she knew she wanted to kiss him, but a more honest part of her heart always kept suggesting that it'd started when he walked into the room carrying chips and Coke and cake.

It was probably all irrelevant, anyway, firstly because Nick had been thinking the same thing and secondly because her body had stopped taking orders from her mind a few minutes ago.

At first their lips met briefly. Sara, focused on the soft touch of Nick's lips against hers, forgot about such things as being on the clock, and in a lab into which anyone could walk without warning, and didn't even really notice, beyond the warmth and the fact that it all felt unreasonably _safe_, that they'd somehow ended up holding each other.

Nick was a gentle, tentative kisser. She'd heard all the ladies' man stuff - admittedly, that had died down over the last few years - and these certainly weren't the kisses of a man who wanted nothing more than to get her into bed. She'd experienced that sort.

Nick's pager beeped, startling them both. Automatically they stepped apart, and Sara immediately, half-ashamed of herself, realised the absence of him.

"Warrick," said Nick, wryly. "He wants to know where the hell I am, just not so polite."

"Ah." Sara, embarrassed now, looked down at the floor. This wasn't how Sara Sidle behaved, she was an idiot, she should _never_ have let him come bearing gifts.

"Yeah." Nick drew a deep breath. "Look, Sara, we should probably talk about this. I'm off at half-one, and you've pulled masses of overtime. Clock off and we can go get some food. Talk about this."

Sara looked up again and forced herself to meet his eyes. "I can do that. That's - uh - a good idea."

Nick nodded, and smiled. "I'll see you soon," he whispered softly, and kissed her, just once.

Sara watched him go and, smiling in a way that Sara Sidle did _not_ smile, she turned back to the computer.

Maybe it was going to be a good New Year after all.

* * *

**THE END**


End file.
